From the Editor: Presenting the Top 12!

Friday, June 03, 2011 -- Hello All,

Im proud to present the Top 12 Retailers and Top 12 Installers,
based on industry and consumer votes, for 2010-2011.

This year marked the first time that consumers were encouraged to participate
in selecting their favorites stores to be included in the Top 12. I
hope that each of the stores in the Top 50 Retailers and with installers
in the Top 100 took advantage of this opportunity to reach out and build
rapport with your customers.

Now the categories. In the past, the Top 12 Retailers have been separated
into categories based on number of locations. This resulted in a perceived
disadvantage, since a minimum of 3 businesses of each size were guaranteed
spots in the Top 12, whether they campaigned for votes or not. We remedied
this by basing the categories on the stores that worked the hardest
to get votes, which is why youve seen category names change from
year to year, and why some categories have had more than one winner.

Of course, some retailers worried that large chains would dominate
the votes because of their sheer reach, but this has yet to happen 
which leads us to the Top 12 for this year. Of the 12 highest vote-getters,
only three have more than one location; the other 9 are single stores.
This is on par with the ratio of single-store specialists versus chains
in the industry.

As a result, we are doing away with categories this year. 12 specialist
businesses worked their butts off to achieve Top 12 status, and each
will be judged according to the same standard  size does not dictate
any advantages in the final stage.

We will select 4 Retailers of the Year, as is our traditional number,
and these retailers  as well as one installer, will be awarded
at the Mobile Electronics Industry Awards presented by Guidepoint Systems
at this years MERA KnowledgeFest event in Dallas.

I applaud the industry for participating in our greatest honor, and
congratulate all of the Top 50, Top 100 and especially the Top 12 for
a job well done. I look forward to the awards celebration, and hope
to see you there!

Sincerely,

Solomon Daniels, Editor-in-Chief

Presenting the Top 12 Retailers for 2010-2011
As selected by industry and consumer votes, in order of highest votes
received